Clams

The air was warm but the sun was gone—the lake was usually sunny and bright, but not today. I wandered along the rocky shores, watching the tall figure ahead of me. He called back that he would be walking around the curve of the island, and I nodded my consent. I stayed where I was. Clam shells dotted the ground, standing out against the smooth pebbles. The nearer I got to the water the more shells I saw, until they began to be not just empty fragments and broken half shells, but full clams. Most were partially submerged in the sand, with the water lapping over them. The clams were everywhere—mottled brown, slightly oblong circles in great quantities, almost as numerous as the rocks. I felt them—sharp edges and smooth centers underneath my wrinkly feet. Walking in the cool water all day had numbed me slightly to the sensation.

I crouched low to the ground, plucking one single clam from its’ watery home. I held it above me and watched it close tightly, sealing out any chance of me prying it open. My young body held itself taut above the grit underneath, excepting the slight bulge of my thighs as they squeezed out of my swim suit bottoms. I held myself carefully in that crouched position, not daring to feel the cool water lap at my rear.

I held the clam in one hand and held myself steady with the other. I looked around the water near me and selected a large rock. Then I crawled out of the water to find another rock that would stay anchored in the ground. When I found it, I placed my clam on top, and slightly brought the rock in my hand down upon it.

Nothing.

The second time I smacked much harder, and instantly felt the clams’ delicate outer home crack and crumble between the two rocks. Disgust filled me as I looked down upon the light pink flesh that I had so desired to see, being pierced and bothered by the sharp fragments that had once been its’ safe place.  One organism, sentenced to death by curiosity. Could I claim curiosity though? Or was it another emotion entirely? I could almost see a tiny pulse in the pink meat that was spread across the rough sandstone. Delicate and exposed and hurt—the clam had not meant to vulnerable. I had taken it there.

The barely swirling waters around me threatened to pull my now-dead clam back into the watery grave where they all came from. The sound of approaching footsteps pulled me out of my horrified revelry. My hasty attempts to cover the clam were not in vain.

There was no trace of my shame on the beach that day. The clam lay buried beneath sand that would soon wash away, leaving simply the leftover shell of an unsuspecting clam.